Veterans sue MoD for war trauma

A group of 280 ex-servicemen are suing the Ministry of Defence in the largest group action of its kind to seek compensation for post-traumatic stress disorder.

The veterans, who between them have served in almost every recent military action involving British forces - including Bosnia, the Gulf, the Falkands and in Northern Ireland - claim the MoD failed to diagnose and treat those suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

The men say they were poorly trained for the effects of conflict, exposed to unnecessary danger and that afterwards the ministry failed to diagnose or treat their condition or to put adequate support systems in place.

The claimants include 40 Welsh Guardsmen who were trapped in the burning shell of the Sir Galahad warship after it was attacked by Argentine planes during the Falklands war.

Many of the survivors of that attack say they have since been unable to work as result of the psychological stress they suffered and some claim not to have had a full night's sleep since the attack in which 50 of their comrades died.

The 280 individual claims are to be brought in the High Court in two group actions next year, claiming medical negligence and seeking compensation for loss of earnings.

If these cases are successful, the government could face compensation claims from thousands more ex-servicemen totalling hundreds of millions of pounds.

John Mackenzie, a solicitor representing 50 of the claimants, said PTSD was a "deeply disabling" condition that had left many of the veterans emotionally scarred.

He told Radio 4's Today programme: "The basis of the action is that the MoD and services should have taken better steps to diagnose and treat the condition once they had acquired it.

"It is a condition that has been recognised in one form or another since the First World War, and probably before that."

The lawyer warned that the litigation could also have implications for emergency services whose employees face similar stresses.

Although the ex-servicemen's claims acknowledge that soldiers, sailors and airmen must accept being exposed to risk and danger during conflict, they are claiming the right to receive treatment for any resulting psychological problems in the same way as they would expect for physical injuries.

The MoD is expected to argue that it could not have predicted the problems as PTSD was little known until recently and was only recognised by the American Psychiatric Society in 1980.

Although 150 people were discharged from the forces for PTSD between1990 and 1998, there is still no single diagnostic test for the disorder, sufferers of which exhibit a range of physical and mental symptoms, including headaches, nightmares, an inability to concentrate and involuntary tics.

Shaun Rusling, chairman of the National Gulf Veterans and Families Association, said the MoD promised to put a system of diagnosis and treatment in place after the Falklands.

He said: "At the time that the troops were returning from the Gulf war in 1991, the MoD failed to keep that promise.

"The result of this failure led to an increase in serving soldiers and ex-servicemen committing suicide and a clear increase in the divorce rate in service families."

The British veterans claim that evidence collected by the Israeli authorities during the Six Day War in 1967 and the experience of American serviceman in Vietnam proved decades ago that servicemen can suffer PTSD as a result of their involvement in military action - yet the MoD did little to alleviate the suffering.

Israel, unlike Britain, has routinely screened and treated troops for PTSD since the 1970s.

An MoD spokesman insisted the ministry had behaved "in line with contemporary best practice in our treatment of service personnel with suspected PTSD".

He added: "We hope that the court's findings on these lead cases will set the scene for the resolution of the remainder of the outstanding claims. We have had measures in place to prevent stress related illness for a number of years.

"We take it very seriously. We are more sophisticated now than when the shell-shock victims of the Second World War were identified."

Bill Sutherland's nightmares began soon after the first bombs hit HMS Plymouth on June 8 1982 .

A chief petty officer in the Royal Navy, he was serving in the Falklands when the ship was attacked, suffering fire and bomb damage.

That day changed his life forever. "I started having disturbed sleep and nightmares, waking with cold sweats, and my personality completely changed."

Mr Sutherland, now 42 and living in Fife, saw action in the Gulf clearing mines off Kuwait in 1991, but he was not diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder until 1995.

As the officer in charge of his ship's fire party, he was asked to take his men to the fire training ground.

"It was absolute terror," he says. "I soiled myself and burst into tears. I had this terrible fear of getting trapped in a fire."

He spent a month in hospital and, after 21 years of service, he was medically discharged in May 1996.

He blames his divorce on the condition, while his fear of crowds means he has only worked for six months since.

"I lost my wife because I wasn't the same person she married. If something had been said or done earlier, my life would be different now."